1. Keep your employees happy. The overhead expense for employees is typically the largest item on a law firm’s balance sheet. This includes salary, overtime, bonuses, insurance, employer’s 401K contributions, and other related expenses. View these expenditures as an investment. Without your staff, you could not function very well. Additionally, it is distracting and time-consuming to train and re-train employees in the procedures of your office, no matter how experienced the employees may be. Most important, happy employees are more productive employees. They will help you be a better lawyer.
2. Rethink spending decisions regularly,
if not constantly. Your decisions made last week or last month may change in light of new circumstances. You must re-assess your decisions each time circumstances change, so this is an ongoing process. Expenses will get out of control if you do not constantly rethink. Because the reassessment process takes a fair amount of dedicated effort, the person filling this role should be very conscientious in watching over the firm’s financial matters.
3. Eliminate expensive overhead expenses. Find expensive areas of overhead and eliminate or modify them if possible, even if an up-front investment may be required. One good example of this may be your copy machine. You may have an older copy machine which is costing you in repair bills over and over; whereas, if you purchase a new copy machine that lasts for years, you will save money over the long term.
4. Beware of vendors. Vendors will entice you to increase your small expenses. They benefit when your small expenses proliferate unnoticed, but you do not.
5. Evaluate each expense. Always ask whether the expense that you are considering is absolutely critical. Do this with each and every expense. But, if the expense is critical, do not be afraid of it.
6. Market your practice. Effective marketing is a good investment of time and money. Unless you are an in-house counsel, a lawyer needs new business to continue to practice law, especially if the practice is representing primarily plaintiffs. Some of the best marketing techniques are not expensive, however. Referral of new business many times comes from personal relationships. Lunches, memberships in organizations, writing notes or letters, and just making periodic phone calls may result in new business for you.
7. Be positive and cordial to all you meet. This may not sound like a “profit-oriented” rule, but everyone remembers how he or she is treated. If you maintain good, positive relationships you will get better cooperation from other lawyers in less time, and thus run your practice with more efficiency.[2] This also applies to your staff and your colleagues at the office. Employees usually resign for a reason other than money.
8. Do not get bogged down in unimportant details. You must be efficient to be profitable. There is a book entitled Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff, And It’s All Small Stuff. As we gain more experience, we learn what tasks need more time than others. You might want to write a note on your computer asking, “Is this advancing the case?” If it does not, do not do it. Or do it later on your personal time.
9. Learn to delegate. Do not try to do all of the tasks yourself. Delegate tasks to employees according to their abilities, leaving you to do the legal work. The goal is to accomplish more in less time, and delegating will help you move your cases along.
10. Be sensitive to trends in the law. The narrower the focus of a practice, the more important this rule becomes. As one area of practice wanes (e.g., premises liability) another may be waxing (e.g., employment law). Attorneys who recognize such trends early are better able to adjust their practices to take advantage or avoid the undertow.
